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On 20 July, we sadly received news that a young man had died while swimming in Shadwell Basin during the spell of hot weather. It is extremely dangerous to swim in the waters and police once again ask residents and others not to use this unsupervised area, even if you are confident that you are a strong swimmer. Here is the report that the police sent councillors about the incident:

At 12.58 a call was made to police reporting somebody had jumped into Shadwell Basin and was now in distress, and had gone under and not resurfaced. Marine Support Unit, Fire Service and Ambulance were all in attendance.

Two significant witnesses identified and informed us that three males had been jumping in and out of the water,further stating they believed they could not swim, as they were pulling each other out. However on this occasion the victim jumped too far and could not be reached by his two friends. The friends ran over to some youths who were nearby and asked them to call police. One of the youths went into the water to try and help but it was too deep and came out.

At 13.28 hours a body was pulled from the basin and at 14.03 life was pronounced extinct by HEMS. Coroners Officer made aware and local CID were updated.

Mike WARDLE (director of Shadwell water sports centre) was on scene and stated that they have been having numerous problems with people jumping/swimming in the basin, and they would not listen to staff about the dangers of swimming in the basin. Further to that there were no life aids available due to them being removed and used by local youths.

Officers were assigned to the basin to prevent further people from swimming and jumping in, but they were ignored even though they had highlighted what had happened earlier.